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December 3, 2007

Bob Watson Is An Embarrassment To Baseball

There's going to be, for lack of a better term, a "Francona Rule". You can only wear your uniform top or jacket. You can't wear your night-shirt, or whatever it is. You can wear it before games, or after games, but not during games. You have to have your uniform top at all times.

Good work, you clown. It's about time you addressed one of the true evils ruining the national game.

It's unprofessional to jokingly name the rule after one particular person, since many managers wear pullovers or short-sleeved jackets (Mike Scioscia, Joe Torre, Bruce Bochy, Eric Wedge, Jim Leyland, John Gibbons). And it's childish to refer to it as a night-shirt.

Francona wears the fleece for medical reasons, which he has explained to MLB in the past. He is often cold because of the blood thinner he takes. "I don't want to get into sob stories, but all the stuff I wear underneath, I feel cooped up. I have two pair of tights. I get a little claustrophobic. [Watson is] aware of that."

This silliness started when a New York police lieutenant spoke to Francona about his clothing in the dugout while the Yankees were batting during a game at Yankee Stadium in late August.

Watch it, Cakey, you will be banned from baseball (see RS's next post above).

I think Francona looks great in his pullover. This is the reason I could never play baseball---I could never wear a uniform. Of course, my limited athletic ability would be another problem, as is my sex (at least for Major League Baseball), but mostly, it's about the uniforms. Yeah, that's it.

For my comment on this absurdity, I'll just go back to the good old wisdom of Mr. George Carlin.

"In most sports the team is run by a coach; in baseball the team is run by a manager. And only in baseball does the manager or coach wear the same clothing the players do. If you'd ever seen John Madden in his Oakland Raiders uniform, you'd know the reason for this custom."

I think it's kind of silly that they have to wear the uniform in the first place. Yes, I realize it's tradition and all that, but there's no reason why the guy shouldn't be allowed to veer from tradition, especially for the medical reasons Francona has... but it's just flat out stupid that someone's actually devoting energy to making this stupid rule a big deal in the first place. Get bent ya dooshe!

Which is why I have been training b-fly from an early age to be a left hander, now if only we could get her to top 94mph she would be a shoo in for the pros (that and getting her to give up ballroom dance ;) ).

As for the pull over, is it Watson doing this or is he under higher orders. Outside of his perceived MFY bias, I really don't think Watson cares, but if you are supposed to be the enforcer maybe Selig is telling him to put the screws on Yerry.

As I was re-reading this I was wondering, didn't McGraw and others used to wear, jackets and ties in the dugout. I wonder if Yerry could ask for special dispensation for returning to the roots of the game?

Actually the reason why baseball managers have to wear uniforms when, say, basketball or football coaches don't is because managers have to actually enter the field of play sometimes as part of their job whereas the others don't.